


lilies and laurel

by Calamitatum



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Action/Adventure, Angst, Canon Disabled Character, Gen, Humour, Post-Canon, Pre-Avatar: Legend of Korra, Spirit World, Temporary Character Death, Toph is very popular in the Spirit World, Violence, a criminally underrated pair imo, am i the first one to use the toph & gyatso tag???, basically a road-trip fic featuring Toph and an ever-increasing gang of spirits, journey of self-discovery
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-09
Updated: 2019-12-23
Packaged: 2020-01-07 03:53:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 11,921
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18402575
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Calamitatum/pseuds/Calamitatum
Summary: In which Toph journeys through the Spirit World with all the grace of a komodo rhino (intentionally), befriends more than a few spirits (unintentionally), and learns to live with death (or something).





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Into the darkness they go, the wise and the lovely. Crowned  
> With lilies and with laurel they go; but I am not resigned.  
> Lovers and thinkers, into the earth with you.  
> Be one with the dull, the indiscriminate dust. 
> 
>  
> 
> \- “Dirge Without Music,” Edna St. Vincent Millay

Toph dies.

Or at least, she thinks she does.

Honestly, it’s kind of a letdown. Not that she ever gave much thought to her own death—she’s about as spiritual as Sokka, and not half as morbid as Zuko—but she’d thought it would at least be _cool._

She’d thought that, with the war gone, it would stay just that. A thought.

But the war was only half the battle. _Negotiation,_ Aang liked to preach these days, somber as a grave. _A century of war, and negotiation is still the hardest battle of all._

Toph used to roll her eyes, but she’s come to realize, Twinkletoes wasn’t far off. It’s been months of this now—hop on Appa, fly to the nearest war-torn village, quell a rebellion, hop on Appa, fly to an even more war-torn village, _incite_ a rebellion. There’s no shortage of action. Toph’s long since learned to leave the political intrigue to the stuffy old men who shout out decrees from their gold-plated balcony windows, like they’re too afraid to step down the streets they once deigned to rule. She doesn’t know what they hope to accomplish with all that—the squats swollen with dirty-footed, skin-and-bone refugees aren’t waiting for some guy in a fancy bathrobe to declare a his “wholehearted commitment to the peace effort,” or _whatever._ They’re waiting for _food._ They need action, they need someone to set things right. They need the Avatar.

“They need,” Aang says, for the ten billionth time, “negotiation.”

Sorry to break it to you, Twinkletoes, Toph thinks and doesn’t say. Words aren’t gonna help them when they’re starving. Words aren’t gonna help them when they’re dead.

But Aang’s already got the weight of expectation from the four corners of the earth, and certainly doesn’t need _her_ peanut gallery input. So Toph swallows her doubts, sets her feet to the ground, sends up a quick prayer to the Spirit of Negotiation or whatever, and follows her friend, as ever, into the fray.

Here’s how it happens.

She’s standing in the midst of a town square—cracked cobblestone scorched to ash in a way that leaves her vision blurry, the pounding of heartbeats and the stomping of feet like the roar of her blood, singing for a fight. This one’s simple—the town’s Earth Kingdom population was kicked to the slums to make way for the factories and conveyor belts that came with Fire Nation occupation, feeding the war effort over feeding the grim-lined mouths of the elderly and cracked-dry lips of the children. War’s over now, and they want back in. Fire Nation says no, Earth Kingdom says yes, and Toph’s never claimed to hold the scale by which justice is measured, but even she can see it’s a pretty simple fix. Fire Nation gets the boot, the colonizing hogmonkeys. Sorry, Sparky.

So she’s standing in the midst of a town square—cracked cobblestone scorched to ash in a way that leaves her vision blurry, the pounding of heartbeats and the stomping of feet like the roar of her blood, singing for a fight.

And a fight she gets.

She doesn’t know who starts it—frankly, doesn’t care. One minute it’s mob chants and the next minute it’s screams—the earth moves beneath and within her, bodies tremble and elbows shove and a dizzying flash of heat sears overhead. She can’t even get a rock wall up for how crowded they all are, like hippopigs in a slaughterhouse, the square teeming with bodies now writhing and sobbing, and the iron of their blood soaks into the ash and sharpens her vision, sticky and wet between her toes.

She doesn’t know who starts it, but she’s about to finish it.

Or, she thought she was, anyway. It’s fireblast this and flurry of boulders that—it’s one minute she’s on her feet, fearless and thoughtless with rage, and the war’s over, it’s _over_ damnit they don’t have to _do this_ anymore they don’t have to fight why can’t they just let it—

It’s one minute she’s on her feet, and the next, she’s down. Hard.

She’s down and she’s breathing in ash, she’s down and she’s breathing out a scream, she’s down and she’s breathing in the smell of her own cooked flesh, she’s down and—

And then she’s not breathing at all.

And Toph dies.

 

* * *

 

Which is why it’s kind of super crazy that she wakes up again.

Not only that, but wakes up, and _doesn’t_ feel like half her head just got singed off. She feels— _fine,_ actually. Suspiciously fine. Like, Katara-just-did-some-serious-mumbojumbo fine.

She’s somewhere soft—a bed? She gropes, pulls up fists of moss and dirt—which, okay, there goes the bed theory—but she can work with this too. She rolls onto her stomach, feeling her way over the edge of her mossy resting place, where the softness gives way to something more compact. _Aha!_ Because where’s there’s dirt there’s rock, and where there’s rock there’s—

Um.

There’s—

Nothing.

She pauses, flattens her hand down against the rock—yep, she knows rock and that’s _definitely_ rock—and waits. Listens. Waits some more.

Still nothing.

“What the…?”

She tries her other hand, flexes and shakes them out and tries again, then rolls to her feet for a third attempt, plants her soles hard and wriggles her toes for good measure.

And sees _nothing._

She sways, arms pinwheeling for a balance she had only seconds ago, and stumbles back into something hard. Wooden, tree-like—ah, it _is_ a tree. A _big_ tree. Or, the roots of one anyway, curving up from the ground in tangled knots. She flattens her palms and traces along them like she used to feel along the walls from one end of the Beifong manor to the other, rarely daring to step into the yawning emptiness of the center for the way her parents and tutors would race to usher back to the side, like she couldn’t be trusted to make her way across a single _room_ without something to hold on to.

The roots get denser, taller, slanting ever upwards. She feels her way up the incline, nails clawed in for traction as she pulls herself up what feels like the base of the tree. And it’s not just big, she realizes. It’s _huge_. Like, size-of-Zuko’s-palace huge.

She doesn’t even know what she’s feeling for, except that down there, there’s rock she can’t see through, and up here, at least it makes _sense_ that she can’t see. The roots are solid and sun-warmed, veins rich with the life they’ve dug up from the earth, guiding her along with that same tracing-the-walls-of-the-room safety. They seem to hum beneath her palms, something almost spiritual about them. Plus, uphill just feels—right. From a purely survival standpoint, uphill means visibility – if not for her, then at least for anyone who might be looking for her. And what better place to find someone lost in a forest than at the trunk of the world’s biggest—

What a minute.

Is she? In a forest?

It makes sense—humungous magical trees don’t just grow on—well, trees. She doesn’t remember anyone pointing out anything of the sort as they flew Appa over the town square. But the Earth Kingdom has plenty of dense, poorly-charted forests. So that’s where she’s gotta be, right?

But then, forests aren’t just full of trees. There should be animals too. Yet, she hasn’t heard a single centifly buzz or hummingsquirrel chirp. Come to think of it, she hasn’t heard _anything._ Not even the wind.

“Duh, Toph, you idiot.” She smacks her face. “You’ve got _other_ senses.” And more importantly, so does anybody who might be looking for her.

“Hey! Twinkletoes! Sugar Queen! I’m over here!” she bellows. Her voice hits the sky with an echo, bouncing out over the treetops. Uphill was definitely the right choice—she sounds like the tallest thing for miles. Chest heaving, she listens, and waits.

Nothing. No answering call. No chattering animals or flocks of birds taking flight. Not so much the rustle of a bush.

“Ugh, come on. Aang! Katara!” Jeez, she’ll even take Sokka at this point. “Anyone?”

But there’s nothing. She alone.

“Okay,” she huffs. “You’re alone. Big whoop. You’ve had worse.” At least she’s not locked in a metal cage like some kind of animal being carted off to spirits-know-where. She didn’t freak out then and she’s not going to freak out now. Nope. No sir. Absolutely not.

She needs a plan. She needs to—assess her situation, or something. That’s what Sokka would probably say, anyway.

So, she assesses.

She’s in a forest (maybe), alone (supposedly). Not just alone – _alone_ alone. No people, no animals, and no _bending._ But hey, that’s fine. That’s cool. So what if she can’t see? No bending means no fire either, no shriek of pain caught like smoke in her lungs, no blast of heat searing out across her, and that’s the last thing she remembers isn’t it, she remembers dying—and she _did_ die, didn’t she—and now she’s alone in a mysterious place where she can’t bend and that sounds a lot like the—

Nope. No no no. No freaking out. She wipes at the wet heat behind her eyes, straightens out the tremble of her fists like they’re a personal offense. She’s not freaking out she’s _not—_

“Guys!” she shouts again. “I’m over here! I’m right here!” She stomps her feet for good measure, aims an ineffectual kick at the nearest knot of roots.

And _misses._

The roots seem to shift beneath her, like a coiling snake, dodging the blow. Her foot swings wildly with misaimed anger and sends her toppling backwards with a shout. She hits the ground and starts to slide – a graceless tumble that has her hitting what feels like every bump and tangle of roots possible on the way down, and down, and _down,_ until she finally collapses on flattened earth.

Breathless from the fall, Toph lays spread-eagled, heart hammering and staring sightlessly upwards. Her fingers tighten in the earth around her. Moss. _Great._ Right where she started.

“My,” says a voice to her immediate left. “That was quite a fall.”

Toph shrieks and scrambles back, smacks her head on something hard and curses. “Hogmonkeys! You can’t sneak up on a girl like that!”

“Apologies,” the voice offers placidly, despite the perfectly arguable fact that Toph was the one sneaking up. Well, falling in, more like. “Are you alright?”

The tone holds some actual concern, which, while annoying, at least points to _probably not about to attack._ Less startled now, she can tell it’s a man—and an old one, if the gravelly scratch of his throat is anything to go by.

“I’m fine,” she says tersely, and stands but doesn’t move any closer. “Who are you?” There’s a number of other questions on her tongue too— _where am I_ and _what’s going on_ and _am I dead,_ to name just a few. But Toph guards her weakness, doesn’t let the confusion show just yet.

“My name is Gyatso,” says the voice.  “And you are?”

“Toph,” she says. Then, “Beifong,” in case it might earn her any brownie points.

“It is a pleasure to meet you, Toph Beifong. I was meditating just now before you arrived. Care to join me?” There’s a smile to the voice, like he’s more pleased by the interruption than anything, and from the height it sounds to be coming, Toph realizes, he is in fact seated.

The final vestiges of suspicion trickle away. “Eh, I’m not really big on the whole mediating thing.” She moves forward anyway, sitting cross-legged before him.

“That's alright. We can just talk, if you’d like.”

“Sure, why not?” she shrugs. This wouldn’t be her first time stopping to chat with random old men in the wilds, after all. Hasn’t failed her yet.

“I would offer you some tea, but…”

“But there’s no food in the Spirit World, is there?” Toph sighs. The words don’t seem quite as daunting, said out loud. Feeling Gyatso’s searching gaze, Toph straightens. She sets her mouth in a hard line. She isn’t scared.

“No,” he says regretfully, “I’m afraid there isn’t.”

Well, at least he didn’t try to beat around the bush to protect her _delicate sensibilities._ Still, best to be as clear as possible, with these types of things. “Why am I here?”

“I imagine,” Gyatso says, voice gentle with the waver of a bittersweet smile, “it is because you are dead.”

Toph closes her eyes. Opens them, and says, “Monkeyfeathers.”

There’s a pause, then the ripple of a laugh. “I’ll be honest, I was expecting a bit more of a reaction.”

“Yeah, well,” she drawls. “It takes a little more than that to spook me these days.”

“You’re at peace?” Gyatso asks, curiosity colouring the words.

“With my death? Suuure.” She crosses her arms, head tilted back in thought. “I probably deserved it, really. Let my guard down and everything. Bet it looked _super_ embarrassing.”

Another pause. Gyatso doesn’t seem to know what to say. Toph saves him the lapse by cutting straight to the heart. “So! How do I get back?”

“Back?”

“To the regular world. Human world.” She waves a hand. “Whatever you call it.”

“Toph,” Gyatso says, not unkindly, and Toph knows that tone—the same tone her tutors took whenever she demanded to be taught something harder, the same tone her parents took whenever she dared to ask to leave the grounds. _That’s just not possible, darling._

“I’m afraid that’s not—”

“Nuh-uh, don’t give me that crap.” She snaps out a finger. “I’m not as dense as I look, mister.” And maybe she’s no Man-With-The-Plan Sokka, but Toph picked up a thing or two from Aang over the seasons. “Regular people don’t go to the Spirit World. Spirits go to the Spirit World, and Avatars go the Spirit World, but not regular ol’ dead little girls.” She plants her fists on her hips. “If I’m here, there has to be a reason. Unfinished business, destiny, you know the like. And as soon as I complete that destiny, back I go.”

“Hm.” For a moment, Gyatso actually seems to consider it. “I admire your fortitude. A remarkable trait in one who’s been through so much.”

“Uh,” Toph says. “Thanks?”

“However, it sounds to me like maybe you haven’t truly made peace with your death after all. You’re not wrong that it is rare for a human spirit to be sent here after death. But perhaps,” he says slowly, carefully, like coaxing a wounded badgerrabit out of its hole, “this is only a temporary resting place, until you are ready to fully cross over.”

 _Nice try, old man._ And here she was actually starting to like him. “Nope. I’m not crossing anywhere but back where I came from. Aang still needs me.”

There’s a beat. “Aang?”

A wolfish grin splits her face. Bingo. The spirits just _loooove_ Twinkletoes _._ “Yeah, the Avatar. Ever heard of him? I hear he’s kinda got sway with your kind. The bridge between worlds and all that.”

“Indeed.” Gyatso sounds a little winded.

She raises an eyebrow, smug in her newfound confidence. “That means you’ll help me, right? I mean, it _is_ what the Avatar would want.”

Gyatso wavers. “I’m… not sure.”

She clicks her tongue, dropping back into a slouch. Crud. And she really _was_ starting to like the guy too. “Well, whatever. I’m going back to the real world, one way or another. You can either sit here and—do whatever it is spirit guides do without anyone to guide, or you can come along for the ride.” She straightens to her feet, rolling her neck and stretching out her arms. Might as well get this show on the road.

“Spirit guides?” comes the startled response.

“Isn’t it obvious?” She rolls her eyes. “You’re a spirit, I’m a human. You just _happen_ to be meditating right where I crash land. I mean, come on. You’re _clearly_ my spirit guide. _Soooo_ —” She splays her arms. “Come guide me or whatever!”

“Well,” Gyatso says. “I supposed there’s no arguing with that kind of logic, is there?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello friends! 
> 
> I have loved this series for forever and have always wanted to write something for it. This idea struck me out of the blue the other day and I've decided to run with it. I have about one and a half ideas of where I'm going with this, but please, come along for the ride!
> 
> Comments and kudos are forever appreciated <3


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had to do some rule _bending_ (hahaHAHA get it?) vis-à-vis the Spirit World in order for this story to make sense. I tried to avoid directly contradicting canon, but I never watched Legend of Korra, so I apologize if anything doesn't add up. If you are confused for now, don't worry--Toph is too!

For a stuffy old spirit man, Gyatso makes surprisingly good company.

Toph spins in a circle to pick a direction, and together, they walk. With no map and no sun in the sky besides, there’s hardly a difference between eastward and westward, but that was always more Sokka’s thing anyway. She’ll take _away-from-the-giant-tree-ward_. She’s not looking to repeat that kind of tumble again. Spirit guide or no, there’s only so much a girl’s pride can take.

So, she picks a direction, and they walk.

Gyatso floats along beside her, soundless as a whisper, every step seeming to hang in the air as though reluctant to leave it. Toph matches pace—or maybe he does—until they’re step-in-floating-step. The underbrush is thick and unruly, the earth rising and falling with swells and dips, and more than once, Toph has to throw out a hand to steady herself, finding his answering hand each time, fingers ice-cold and touch light as a breeze.

“There now,” he steadies her. “You’re alright.”

Toph tears her hand back, spreads her stance, and plunders on.

So yeah, the company’s not bad, even if he’s kind of lacking on the conversational side of things.

It takes him nearly an hour to ask.

“Toph, at the risk of sounding condescending… Do you have any sort of destination in mind?”

“Nope,” she grins. “But I like to think life’s more about the journey.”

Surprisingly, this earns a chuckle instead of the expected resignation. “I don’t disagree. But death, unfortunately, doesn’t quite work the same way.”

“Maybe not,” she shrugs. “But I have a plan.”

The average person might need more than a stroll through the woods to contemplate the meaning of life, death, and everything in between, but Toph’s never been anything close to average, and isn’t about to start now. If she’s here, it’s because she needs to complete some sort of Spirit World Mission. Some sort of journey of self-discovery or something. The Spirit World’s all about that kinda stuff—or so Aang’s lectured once or twice while she’s pretended to listen. Whatever the fates have in store, it’ll come to her, one way or another. She remembers Snoozles telling her about his trip with Hei Bai through the Sprit World—how he was dragged around randomly until he magically found his way back again. And honestly? If that worked for Sokka, it’ll work for her. If there’s one thing being blind is good for, it’s wandering around aimlessly.

“Is your plan to wander around aimlessly?" Gyatso asks, a teasing lilt to his voice.

“Wow, you didn’t tell me you were a mind-reader too.”

Another laugh—but it cuts out with a ghostly, cool-fingered touch to her wrist. “There’s a fallen tree there. Come around this way.”

Toph lets him lead, takes the brief reprieve from navigation to let her senses wander. There’s definitely something undeniably _sprirty_ about this whole place. There’s the obvious lack of life—no croaking of cricketfrogs, no chirping of swallowherons. But it’s more than that. The air smells strange and thick, heavy like it’s got a presence of its own—something both ancient and alive, like mildew in a fresh water spring. It breathes out over them, denser as they walk in a gentle but noticeable downward slope, further and further from the place she awoke. Thankfully, there’s nothing overtly threatening about the place yet. She’s warm without sun, cool without wind. She isn’t hungry or thirsty or even tired. She’s perfectly—nothing.

Man. The Spirit World is _weird._

“Soooo,” she says, shedding the lingering unease like brushing off dirt, “What, like, _are you_ , anyway?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, you’re a spirit guide, right?”

“It would seem.”

“So, how did you get here?”

A pause. They both seem to realize they’re still arm-in-arm at the same second, and quickly pull away. “I’m—not entirely sure myself.”

Huh. That _sounded_ like a lie. Not for the first time, Toph feels the ache of emptiness her bending used to fill. “It’s just,” she presses, “you seem awfully _human_ for a spirit, ya know?”

“I suppose I’ll take that for a compliment?”

She stops, turns and faces him. Not that it really does any good, but people always have a harder time lying straight to her _poor helpless blind_ _girl_ face. “Did you used to be alive, or what?”

“I did,” Gyatso says, after a lengthy pause. “A long time ago.”

“How long?”

“Long.”

“How did you die?”

A strangled sigh. “Toph—”

“What?” she snaps, and feels an angry flush rise to her cheeks. “I’m not some innocent little girl who needs to be sheltered from the truth.” And then, because it rises out of her before she can stop herself, “I got _burned alive,_ okay? Nothing you tell me is gonna top that.”

Gyatso takes a step back, voice hard and strained. “Toph, please, that’s—” The words cut off with a rumble, low like the growl of a beast, and Gyatso gasps. “Watch out!”

She drops to a crouch before the words are even uttered, center of gravity low, hands grasping the vines at her feet like Appa’s reigns on steep dive. But the threat isn’t from above—it’s _below._ The earth swells like a bubble, rock buckling outwards, and sends Toph sprawling back with a cry. She curls her toes to keep them from getting crushed, hands scrabbling for purchase, but just as fast as it expanded, the earth retracts, sighs inwards like the exhale of a lung, and the world goes weightless in freefall.

The last thing she hears is Gyatso call her name.

 

* * *

 

She wakes choking on dust, and, by some miracle, finds she hasn’t been crushed like a pancake.

She coughs until she’s inches from puking up a lung, rolls onto her stomach to heave and feels about twenty pounds of rubble slide off her and go tumbling down whatever outcropping she’s found herself on with an echoing clatter. Her tongue is thick with dirt and sand, a chipped tooth and split lip that’s going to hurt in the morning. She spits, uses it to rinse the dust off her hands so they’ve got some grip again, and gets to work clearing whatever’s got her left leg pinned in place.

“Gyatso?”

Nothing.

Flying hogmonkeys. Not this again.

She calls out a few more times—finds answers in nothing but echoes. A bone-rattling chill hangs in the air, the sound of trickling water from somewhere nearby, and that, coupled with the echoes, paint a pretty solid picture of what happened.

She’s underground.

A sinkhole. Of _course._ She slaps the rock like it’s done her a personal insult and sends out a stream of curses against every spirit she knows. Gyatso included.

“Sure would be awful nice to be an earthbender right about now!” she rages into the silence.

Exhausted from her tirade and the many, _many_ bruises that no doubt litter her, she shifts around, feeling for the edges of wherever she’s landed, and finds a steep drop. She tosses another bit of rubble and counts the seconds down. The echo bounces off the walls of her cavern and deeper into the earth, but the drop itself thankfully doesn’t seem longer than a few feet. Alright then. Decided, she stands, gripping the wall for balance and trying to see if she can feel her way back to the surface. Not so lucky there—it’s all smooth rock and steep climb. She may already be dead, but another fall like that might genuinely kill her.

She settles for sliding down to solid ground instead. If those echoes were anything to go by, this isn’t any old sinkhole. Sure enough, the walls of her rocky prison curve along, deeper into the earth, branching out into a cavern system of twisting tunnels. Toph hunts out the sound of trickling water and follows it backwards to the closest approximation of an upward slope, stopping every few dozen feet to call out for Gyatso.

He can’t have gone _that_ far, right? Barring any spooky spirit nonsense, they would have fallen right beside each other. And it’s not like Gyatso could _die._

But—Could he be hurt? The thought strikes, and she instantly wishes it hadn’t. Could spirits even _get_ hurt? Fiddlesticks. Maybe she _should_ have paid more attention when Twinkletoes was talking about all his Spirit World mumbojumbo.

Toph gnaws her lip. She calls out again, voice growing in pitch. Tears of frustration burn at her eyes. If Gyatso _is_ hurt there’s turd-all she can do about it. Least of all because she can’t even _find_ the old geezer.

Then, another thought strikes, even worse than the last.

What if he doesn’t want her to find him?

What if—What if he _left?_ What if he got sick of her prying, sick of her aimlessly, recklessly blundering around? What if she’s alone again?

No sooner has the dread sunk in then something shifts in the rocks to her left “Gyatso?” She stumbles toward the sound, trips in a puddle of water and feels the cold soak through the bottoms of her pantlegs. “Aghk!”

The rocks shift again, this time accompanied by an very _un-Gyatso-like_ chittering.

She freezes, ears strained.

The chittering gets louder—closer, the sounds of claws scuttling along the floor, directly towards her.

She rears back, but the—whatever it is, just launches itself into the puddle with a pleased little squeak, a high-pitched whisper of a laugh, almost like a squirrelmouse. It splashes about, happy as a turtleduck in a pond, and Toph sighs out her relief, settles down on her haunches and sticks out a careful finger. The creature nudges it, delightfully soft and unapologetically soaked.

“Aw,” she coos. “Hey, little guy. You’re not so scary, huh?”

The creature chitters and splashes and lets her pet it some more, even rolling over to expose it’s squishier underside. “You wanna be my new spirit guide?” she says, and tries to ignore the tremble on the question. “You wanna help me get home?”

It snaps to attention, chittering with a new frequency—bright and urgent, as though genuinely trying to convey an answer. Then, just as fast, it takes off.

“Oh, wow, didn’t think that would actually work.” Toph springs to her feet and follows clumsily, head cocked for the echoes of its scratching, tracing the wall with one hand and the low ceiling with the other. “Slow down, little guy!”

Thankfully, it seems to be following the trickle of runoff from the puddle it was enjoying so thoroughly, sloping downwards through the tunnels. She speeds up, more confident with each step, lets her momentum carry and whisk away her breath, pulse like thunder in her ears.

Which is why she doesn’t hear it until it’s too late.

The narrow passage breaks open into a wide cavern, roaring with running water and alive with the sounds of scurrying and splashing—chittering and squeals that echo from wall to wall. There must be dozens—maybe even hundreds of the things, swarming the cavern like a hive of mothbees.

Toph stumbles to a halt, and within seconds, feels the scratch of tiny claws on her toes, her ankles, crawling up her legs.

She screams and kicks out, sending a few flying, but they’re replaced within seconds. She stumbles back, crashes into the wall, feeling desperately for the exit before her arms get dragged down too and she collapses.

Just as quick as she’s down, she’s back up again, a hand wrapped around her arm and hoisting her to her feet. She presses back against the wall as a body steps before her like a shield, delirious with relief—Gyatso came _back_ —but her smile freezes and cracks as an arc of fire blasts out across the room. Heat blossoms against her skin, sucking the moisture from her eyes, and she flinches back—the last time she felt fire this close she was—was—

“It’s okay, it’s okay,” says an unfamiliar voice, breathless but unwavering. “Just stay still.” Another blast of fire, and the creatures sound panicked now as they scurry back. The cavern rings out with splashes as they hit the water, tiny bodies diving for cover.

The hand grabs hers and pulls. “This way!”

Toph stumbles along as they run, feet catching, but the stranger doesn’t let her fall. “There’s an exit ahead.”

The voice—a man, or something like one anyway—pulls her out of the cavern, back up the way she came, but it’s only a few dozen feet before she wrenches herself back, gasping, heart thunderous. “You’re a firebender!”

The man stops. He doesn’t come any closer. “I am.”

“Are—Are you a spirit?”

“I—Yes.”

Toph shakes her head, accusing. “There’s no bending in the spirit world.”

“Not for humans, no. The rules are different for us. It’s not really—bending, exactly.” He takes a halting step toward her. “It’s okay. I’m not going to hurt you.”

She takes a step back anyway, back to the wall and toes curling into the rock, grounding. She presses her lips together, assessing. _Man._ She _really_ wishes she could lie detect right now.

“It’s okay,” the voice says, soft and regretful. “You don’t have to come with me. Just let me point you in the right direction, okay? I want to make sure you get out of here safely.”

Ugh. He sounds so _sincere_ , darn him _._ “Fine,” she grumbles. “I trust you.” It’s not like she really has a choice.

He begins to walk, loud and slow, letting her follow at her own distance. They twist, duck, and climb the cavernous maze in delayed synchronisation. He doesn’t touch her again, which she appreciates, at first, but four stubbed toes later, she swallows her pride and thrusts out an arm.

He takes her elbow with that same, cool breeze of a touch as Gyatso. “Not much further now,” he says, a smile in his voice. “The mouth of the cave is just up ahead.”

“How’d you find me all the way down there?” she asks.

“I saw the cave-in and heard the screams,” he explains. “Most of the spirits around these parts know to avoid the caves where the water sprites play.”

She shivers. “Is that what those things were?”

There’s a polite chuckle. “They’re harmless most of the time. Just mischievous.”

Whatever. He can sing their praises for all she cares—as long as she can still feel the ghost sensations of tiny claws prickling across her skin, she’ll make like the rest of the spirits and avoid them too.

“Almost there,” the man says, not long after. Sure enough, an upwards swell breaks out into warmer, fresher-smelling air. So grateful is she for the sounds of the surface, it takes her a second to realize, there are _sounds_ on the surface. The rustles of forest-life, the flutter of leaves in a phantom breeze, the cool mist of fog in the air—hints of life the world was so eerily missing before. She’s made progress then, from wherever she was before. Still, knowing the things rustling in the underbrush might just be more of those sprites, she’s not exactly elated to be acquainted.

She tightens her hold on the arm around hers. “Say,” she starts slowly. “Since you seem so knowledgeable about these parts, how would you feel about coming on a little adventure with me?”

Laughter, bright and warm and—familiar? He pats her arm. “I thought you’d never ask.”

“Really?”

“Really. Between you and me, the Spirit World gets kind of old when you’re the only thing that speaks for miles.”

She pumps a fist. “Ha! I knew I liked you—uh, what was your name again?”

“Toph!” comes a nearby cry, sharp with panic.

She whirls to face the voice. “Gyatso?”

“Get away from him!” Closer now, frightened. Almost—angry.

“What?” She retracts herself, but only to throw out an arm in front of her new friend, as though to shield him from an oncoming attack. “No, it’s fine, he’s—”

And that’s when she understands. Her arm knocks him square on the chest—no, breastplate. Hard, metal armor.

Fire Nation armor.

She draws back as though burned. But then—it makes sense, if he’s a firebender, doesn’t it? And he didn’t use it to hurt her. He could have, but he didn’t. She wavers, fear and guilt warring. No. He helped her. He helped her when he didn’t have to.

So what if he was a Fire Nation soldier? The war’s over. The war is _over._

“Gyatso, wait,” she says, and widens her protective stance. “We can trust him.”

“Toph, he’s—”

“A firebender, I know.”

Gyatso’s panting—and since when has he even breathed?—like he’s just run a mile. Like he’s scared.

“It’s okay,” she says. “This is my friend, uh—”

“Lu Ten,” he supplies helpfully.

Oh _spirits._ A sharp pang cuts through her—something between elation and grief. Longing, too. For Iroh, who she’s been too busy to visit in months. For Zuko, cooped up in the palace and who she hasn’t seen in twice as long. For everyone she left behind, everyone who thinks she’s _dead,_ who might be mourning her even now.

“It’s okay, Gyatso,” she says softly, drained from the burst of emotion. “We can trust him.” He found her when she needed him, just like Gyatso, when she first came tumbling from the sky. “He’s here for a reason.”

Gyatso moves in warily, but he doesn’t attack or flee, so that must be a good sign. “How can you be sure?”

“Look, if he wanted to hurt me, it would have been a lot easier down in that pit of pigeonrats.”

“Sprites,” Lu Ten says.

“Whatever.”

Lu Ten extends a hand to Gyatso. “I just want to help. I’m like you.”

“Wait, Gyatso’s a firebender too?”

“No.” Gyatso sounds annoyed, and from what Toph can hear, he doesn’t take the hand. But he does say, “He means we’re both spiritwalkers.”

“You’re both—what now?”

“Spirits made corporeal,” Lu Ten explains. “We help people like you, people who are—in between.”

“So it would seem,” Gyatso says.

“So what you’re saying is…” Toph says slowly, “I have _two_ spirit guides?”

Lu Ten laughs—and wow, he really does sound _so much_ like his father. Toph smiles, bittersweet, like she could commit the sound to memory.

Even Gyatso lets out a huff of laughter. Not exactly an olive branch, but, well, she'll take it. After all, she’s starting to think she’s going to need all the help she can get.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello again and sorry for the wait on this one! This story's actually mostly written, I'm just allergic to sticking to any sort of schedule, apparently. But thank you to everyone who has taken the time to leave kudos and comments--it really does help to kick my ass into gear <3
> 
> Again, I gotta stress, canon Spirit World rules are long gone and moved on, friends. Resulting revelations are on the way, in this chapter and the next, so be warned!

And like that, her group of adventurers increases by one.

They continue in the same direction, Gyatso on one side, Lu Ten on the other. Toph takes turns switching between the two for guidance, not willing to risk walking on her own again and in case they stumble into any more funny business. It’s still a little tense between the two, but both Gyatso and Lu Ten at least seem willing keep up her banter when prompted. Otherwise, they journey in silence.

The terrain stays relatively even, at first, and seems to make for good progress, but as the hours creep ever onwards, she can feel herself slowing down. The underbrush grows unrulier, the trees denser and roots longer, and a few close calls almost have her going down again.

“Watch it,” she tells Lu Ten, clinging tight.

“Sorry,” he says, and steadies her. “It’s getting dark.”

“It’s—what?” She stops. “Dark?” She hadn’t considered there could _be_ a night-time in a place with no sun.

“We should stop,” Gyatso suggests. “It’ll be safer with more light. Besides, you look like you could use a rest.”

He doesn’t have to tell _her_ twice. Toph bets she looks exactly like death warmed over after the day she’s just had. They meander for another few minutes until Gyatso finds a satisfactory clearing. Toph sinks down onto the grass, lets her eyes close with a grateful sigh as she curls around herself, head pillowed on her arms. Gods, being horizontal is _amazing._

“One of us should keep watch,” Gyatso mumbles some time later, startling her from the brink of sleep she’d unknowingly slipped off to.

“I’ll take first,” Lu Ten whispers.

Toph lies still, ears strained, but the conversation ends there. There’s a sudden blast of heat, and Toph tenses, but the crackle of wood reveals it’s just a campfire. After a minute, Toph scoots closer—and doesn’t realize until a moment later how _cold_ the night had fallen. She sighs, tips her head in the direction of the warmth and lets it wash over her, gentle pulses of heat against the backs of her eyelids.

Gyatso and Lu Ten are perfectly silent—whether they need to sleep or even breathe is still beyond her. It’s not exactly as familiar as ending the day with Sokka’s ear-splitting snores or Katara’s fussing or Aang’s endless prattle, but it’s—nice. It’s still nice.

As if perfectly orchestrated to ruin the moment, something rustles in the underbrush—the snap of a twig and the ghostly-familiar chitter laughter.

“It’s okay,” Lu Ten says when she startles. He stands. “It’s just more sprites. I’ll go take care of them.”

She listens until he disappears into the brush, footsteps swallowed beneath the croaks of the forest’s nightlife. But she doesn’t lie down again. Instead, she inches across the clearing. “Gyatso?”

“I’m here, Toph,” he says, and fire-warmed fingers tap her wrist.

She pulls close to the touch, and slowly unwinds back to the ground. “Thanks for not ditching me today,” she whispers. “And… I’m sorry. For being so—For earlier.”

“It’s okay,” he says. Gentle fingers in her hair, hesitant, combing it back from her eyes. It feels nice. It feels _human._

“I was scared,” she says suddenly. “Because you’re this all-knowing spirit, and I’m just some stupid, useless human. But it wasn’t right of me to pry. It wasn’t any of my business.”

There’s a long pause. “I’m not an all-knowing spirit, Toph. I used to be a stupid, useless human too,” he says softly, almost wistful. “I was a monk, at the Southern Air Temple.” The fingers in her hair still. “I died in a Fire Nation raid.”

Her breath comes out hard. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s alright. I’ve made peace with my death. I was very old, and I lived and long and wonderful life. My only regret was that I couldn’t protect… those who hadn’t yet gotten a chance to.”

“I understand why you don’t like Lu Ten,” she says.

There’s a rustle as he shakes his head. “It’s wrong of me hold what his people did against him. My death was long before his time. He’s a—good man. It’s as you said, he’s here for a reason.”

“For what it’s worth, I died in a Fire Nation attack too. So—I get it,” she says. “But I promise we can trust him. I know someone he’s related to. Two people, actually. One of them’s, uh, more of an acquired taste. But I think you’d really get along with the other. He’s about your age too, give or take, like, a hundred years.”

By the time Lu Ten returns to the clearing, Gyatso’s laughter has quieted, but Toph can tell he’s still smiling.

 

* * *

 

In the morning—or, whatever passes for morning, in the Spirit World—her traveling companions are in much lighter moods. Whatever they talked about to pass the time while she slept, it seems to have dispelled any lingering bad blood between them. There’s a weight to their steps she didn’t hear yesterday—sure-footed, purposeful. They’ve still got no idea where they’re headed, but Toph’s willing to ride the high as far as it will take her.

As they walk, they play a rousing game of _never-have-I-bended,_ in which several startling revelations come to light, largely concerning Gyatso’s surprisingly dodgy past.

“Who knew monks were such hedonists?” Lu Ten wheezes between tears of laughter that only re-double for Toph after picturing Aang on some of Gyatso’s more unlawful escapades.

“Here’s what I still don’t understand,” she eventually manages. “If you’ve been an airbender this whole time, why don’t you just _fly_ us wherever we want to go?”

“It’s not exactly that simple,” Gyatso explains. “In fact, what we do here isn’t really bending at all. We’re not harnessing the elements ourselves, but rather, _asking_ the Spirit World to bend itself around us.”

“Huh.” She’s always considered earthbending less of an _ask_ and more of a _command_ type deal, but she’s heard Aang describe it differently. She rolls her eyes. “Sounds like bending to me.”

Gyatso shrugs. “Fair enough.”

“So how come the Spirit World won’t _bend itself_ around me?”

“It only works for those who have been fully incorporated into the energy cycle of the spiritual sphere.”

“It only works for spirits,” Lu Ten translates. “Sorry, kid.”

 _Never-have-I-bended,_ it turns out, is a lot more complicated with parameters that wide. The game dies off before long. Afterwards, Toph suggests _I-spy,_ but both men point out the obvious problem before she can corral them into the first round. Bummer. She once got a good five minutes into the game with Sokka before he even noticed anything was wrong.

The thought lands like misstep, too quick to recover, stomach sinking with the weight of something heavy and homesick. She wonders how everyone’s doing without her. If they were able to quell the riot after she went down. If they’ve buried her yet.

“Hey,” she says, breaking the blanket of silence. “What’ll happen to my body if I can’t get back in time?”

Underbrush snaps as Lu Ten hits a misstep of his own. Toph drops her hold of his elbow before he can drag her down with him. “Get back?”

“Yeah,” she says slowly, a note of suspicion creeping into the word. “You know, to the real world?”

“Oh, uh, well.” There’s a pause, something unspoken in the air, and nuh-uh, _no way_ , she knows this awkward silence too well—can remember every mouthed word and arched brow shot like arrows over her head, her parents and tutors thinking she would never catch on to their delicate little dance around her.

“Hey!” She snaps out a hand to sever their eye-contact. “I can hear you, idiots. What aren’t you telling me?”

Gyatso clears his throat. “Toph,” he says diplomatically. “I feel perhaps I have been dishonest in allowing you to continue on under your current assumptions. It’s just that, _getting back_ isn’t—well, it isn’t possible.”

She crosses her arms. “Yeah, well, coming from the girl who became the world’s greatest earthbender at the oh-so-tender age of twelve, doing the impossible is pretty much a regular occurrence for me.”

Gyatso sighs, the breath bleeding infinite patience. Somehow, it’s almost worse than if he were angry. “Toph, I know this is hard, but it’s something we all have to do, when our time comes.”

“No,” she says, and plants her feet into the earth hard enough to bruise. “I already told you, I’m not going anywhere while my friends still need me.”

“I admire your loyalty, but—”

“ _But,”_ she cuts in, “you just want me to give up anyway. You just want me to roll over and die. _Literally_ die.”

At last, his patience seems to snap. “You’re _already_ —”

“Whoa, hey!” Lu Ten steps in, twirling her smoothly around by the shoulders. “Okay, look. Both of you need to cool off.”

Toph rolls her eyes. “Spoken like a true firebender.”

This earns her a sharp swat on the wrist—somehow both playful and reprimanding—and which, oddly, reminds her of Katara. “Gyatso, don’t move. We’ll talk later,” Lu Ten says. Then, to her, “Come on. Let’s take a walk.”

He steers her away, back the way they came, out of earshot and then some. Toph’s about to protest when he finally slows. He leans in to give her a gentle nudge. “You okay?”

“Yeah, just peachy.” She blows out a breath that sends her bangs fluttering, swallows and tries again. “He’s such a—such an _airbender.”_

“And you’re an earthbender. Stubborn.” Another nudge. “To a fault.”

Toph’s hums. She’s not exactly in a joking mood anymore.

Lu Ten sighs. “Look, it’s not as easy as he makes it sound. I get it, okay? I—I died young too.”

“Yeah,” she snaps. “In a war you signed up for.”

His breath goes tight. He pulls away, doesn’t touch her again.

“Sorry,” she mumbles. “Sorry, that was—Sorry.”

“It’s okay.”

“No, it isn’t,” she grumbles, but the frustration’s directed inwards this time. “You didn’t deserve to die.”

“And neither did you,” he says, just as quickly. “You’re right. What happened to you was unfair. But you have to understand, Gyatso is just trying to make this part easier for you.”

Man, a few more years, and he might have been just as much a peacemaker as his father. Toph shakes her head. “What about you?”

“What about me?”

“Why are you helping me?”

“I just… want to help.” There’s something in his voice, mournful and soft, like a quiet morning after a terrible storm, still reeling from the damage. “I did a lot of bad, in my life. I know it’s a little late to try to balance the cosmic scales, and I’ve made peace with that, mostly, but—” he shrugs, and his voice brightens in determination. “That doesn’t mean I can’t still try to regain my honour. Even if only from myself.”

The words sting. The obvious connection is there, but Toph can’t help but think of Iroh. Leaving Ba Sing Se in disgrace after being the first in a thousand years to penetrate its walls—a lifetime committed to the battle that killed his son. How the loss, the pain, however terrible, was eventually enough to change the tide of his destiny, to push him to become the man he is today. And Spirits, that man would be _so proud_ to see Lu Ten now.

Was it the best for them, in the end? Was the loss worth it—Lu Ten’s death, Iroh’s grief? Maybe not, but. But it happened. And there was no going back. Only forward, to something better.

Toph blinks hard, clears her throat, and seeks out Lu Ten’s hand again. “I think you already have,” she says, and _means_ it. “If the people you left behind could see you now, they’d be proud. Whatever it is you think you needed to regain—in their eyes or anyone else’s—you already have.”

The hand in hers tightens, the smile in Lu Ten’s voice as fragile as glass, but sincere, when he says, “Thank you, Toph.”

 

* * *

 

They head back to Gyatso, not wanting to keep him waiting too long. Lu Ten’s peacemaking efforts have worked their magic to dull the edge of Toph’s frustration, but even still, no one exactly jumps with joy to be reunited.

“We should keep going,” Gyatso says frostily.

And so they do.

 

* * *

 

The day presses on.

They still seem to be headed downhill—a gentle, winding slope through the forest, but after over a day of nonstop travel, her calves are starting to burn something fierce.  The discomfort is doubled by the hot press of the sun—which she _can_ actually feel now, unlike yesterday, when everything was quiet and strange. It’s like the Spirit World has awakened, becoming more alive around her. That, or she’s just becoming more dead.

She has to stop before long, feet aching and head swimming from the hours without rest. Which is weird, because she wasn’t tired at all yesterday. In fact, even Gyatso and Lu Ten seem a little winded, judging by how heavily they collapse after finally deciding to stop. The conversation Lu Ten had been trying to mediate between them has long since ebbed out, but she swears she can hear their heavy breathing.

“Hey,” she says into the silence. “Is it just me or are we all exhausted?”

“I mean, we _have_ been walking all day,” Lu Ten says.

“Sure, but aren’t you guys spirits? Since when can you even _get_ tired?”

“Technically,” Lu Ten muses, “we’re spiritwalkers.”

“You used that word earlier too,” she says. “What does it mean?”

There’s a beat of silence, and when it breaks, it’s by Gyatso’s voice. “It means we’re not spirits in the traditional sense. Human souls, upon death, aren’t supposed to linger. They’re supposed to pass over, to be put to rest. Over time, they become more of an essence than a spirit. But, when they are needed, they can be called back into their corporeal forms.”

“Needed?”

“When the Spirit World deems it so,” he explains. “Like, for example, to help one who is struggling to pass over.”

Toph sits up, chest oddly tight. “So you guys were—at rest? Before?” And got pulled out because of _her._

“We were,” Gyatso says. “And when our purpose here is fulfilled, to rest we shall return.”

“Oh,” she says, and can’t seem to think of anything else to follow it. No one seems to expect her to, and after a minute, she lays down, stares sightlessly up at the canopy above and swallows down the guilty ache in her chest. She supposes she ought to ease up on Gyatso, if he’s really been disturbed from _eternal rest_ just to help _her._ More importantly, she should hurry up and get herself back to the real world. Apparently, for her sake _and_ theirs.

Ugh. The Sprit World _sucks._


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I got a super nice review today and immediately barfed up this entire chapter! That's really all it takes sometimes!
> 
> I'm also gonna stick a predicted chapter amount on this bad boy because we're nearing the end. Amazingly, I've only added to my initial chapter-length estimate by one, which, as a chronic over-writer, is pretty impressive. 
> 
> Anyway, here's this! :-)

She falls asleep without meaning to. Her dreams come in flashes—a cool breeze turned to searing pain, feet pounding the earth, blood between her toes. Voices, then silence, then falling. She slips into wakefulness like a receding tide, muddled, fingers curling sightlessly in the dirt, and hears voices again, low and close. Aang?

“—out of time.”

“But if she isn’t ready—”

“We don’t have a choice at this point.”

“Gyatso?” She squints and rubs the sleep from her eyes. “Guys?”

“We’re here, Toph,” comes the reply, and the sound of someone moving closer. “Sleep well?”

“Mm.” She pushes herself up. “Didn’t mean to. Sorry.”

“Not at all,” Gyatso brushes her off. “It looked like you could use it.”

She bets. She’s probably a real pretty sight right about now—dirt caked beneath her nails and the once-meticulous twists of her hair. Exhaustion still weighs like a fur coat, but there’s nothing to be done about it now. Places to go, lives to get back to. Or—eternal rests to get back to, anyway. “We should get going.”

Gyatso hums. “Any particular direction?”

Judging by her old plan, it didn’t really matter. Not when she was convinced the necessary spirit mumbojumbo would find its way to her, in time. But according to yesterday’s conversation, she’s not the only one on a time crunch anymore. “Same way as yesterday,” she decides. For the illusion of progress, if nothing else.

“Very well,” Gyatso says, and takes her elbow. “Ready?”

She nods, then pauses. Angles her head to where she thought she heard Lu Ten earlier. He’s been suspiciously quiet. “Unless you can think of something better.”

“It’s your choice,” comes the reply, after a beat.

“Okay,” she says. “Then let’s move.”

So they walk.

And walk.

And walk.

Uphill.

Downhill.

Uphill again.

And—yep, she can hear Gyatso’s laboured breaths, Lu Ten’s heavy armoured footsteps, where they were both once silent as the grave. The heat of the midday sun bears down, not even the flicker of a breeze to cool them off.

She sighs. “We should stop for a bit.”

“Hang on,” Lu Ten pants. “Let’s go until we level out, at least.”

“Yes, I think there’s a clearing at the top of this hill. We can stop there.”

The lack of protest is all the confirmation she needs—they are tired, both of them. Toph feels low flicker of annoyance at whatever they’re not telling her. “Are you guys getting weaker?”

Lu Ten’s steps falter. “What—What do you mean?”

A deflection if she ever heard one. She wrenches herself to a stop. “You are, aren’t you? Does this have to do with what you told me yesterday? About being pulled from your rest?”

“Toph, we’re fine. Please don’t worry about us,” Gyatso soothes, but his voice is rough, almost pained. He makes another grab for her arm.

She dodges, stumbles on the uneven ground but holds tall. An itch tears across her skin and she scowls. “Why are you hiding this from me?”

“It’s not important—"

Another step back. The grass prickles at her soles. Anger flares like a living thing, red-hot. “Quit lying to me.”

“Toph—”

Her fingers curl like claws, digging into skin. Her own skin. _Spirits,_ it itches.

“Toph!” The name is punctuated with a gasp for breath, a cough, and the hairs on the backs of her arms go rigid. Her nails scrape her skin and draw blood, her eyes burning with tears. Something’s wrong.

Lu Ten shouts. “We need to go, we need—” It’s cut off with another cough as he stumbles. Gyatso too, and—and there’s something there, something in the air, heavy, choking, settling like weights in her lungs, tearing across her skin, an itch, a burn—

Gyatso gasps. “Toph, don’t breathe!”

But it’s too late, too late, it ignites her like a flame, and she opens her mouth to scream, feels it invade her throat, writing and searing and—

_Ash, a scream, the smell of her own cooked flesh—_

A blast of air explodes out in a violent tempest, rippling across her skin, seizing the breath from her lungs and the poison from the air. “Hurry!” Gyatso shouts, and a hand closes around her arm, drags her to her feet and off them, forward, uphill—a ragged, desperate climb.

“We need to get out of range.” His voice is laboured, wrecked, and she’s not the only one, they’re hurt too, and she needs to help them, but she can barely get her feet under her. They climb and she stumbles, every step and gasp like twist of pain from deep within her, lungs crying out, bleeding and sore.

She doesn’t know how long they run. Time floats in and out, and she’s hot, sweat pouring down her back, feet numb and skin alight, chest heavy with the smell of poison. She feels herself fall, then stand again, hears a voice but can’t make out the words. There’s another cold blast of air as Gyatso clears them a path, and another, and more after that, but she loses track, just feels the rhythm of the climb, then the fall again when her feet finally give out from beneath her.

And this time, she stays down.

 

* * *

 

As though in attempt to make up for everything she missed the first time, Toph wakes like death warmed over.

It hurts. Blistered skin and wounds where she scratched herself raw, the taste of blood and weight of fire lingering in her lungs. Her very bones ache.

She coughs, spits, coughs again and can barely breathe between them.

“Thank the Spirits,” says a voice from somewhere above, and _jeez_ , not even her _ears_ were spared from the pain train. “You’re awake.”

“Unfortunately,” she tries to say, and heaves up the remains of an empty stomach instead.

She thinks she passes out again. In the next moment, she’s seated, leaning heavily against a tree, with no memory of having been maneuvered there. Spirits. She feels muddled, lost in the gray-black of sightlessness. She feels sick, thoughts murky behind a layer of scar tissue. She feels burned alive.

“Slowly, now, that’s it. You’re alright.” Hands, steadying her. Lu Ten hovers close. “Can you speak?”

She nods, shakes her head. Nods again, and with a throat as coarse as sand, says, “What was that?”

“Some sort of toxin,” says Gyatso. He’s seated somewhere nearby, panting. He sounds—bad. Exhausted. “The Spirit World is full of dangers, but I’ve never seen anything like it.”

“Gyatso managed to airbend most of it downhill,” Lu Ten explains, voice tight with concern. “We should be fine as long as long as we stay upwind and keep moving in the same direction.”

Toph hangs her head, pulls her knees tight to her chest. Like she used to when she hid in the manor’s gardens, like if she tucked up small enough, she’d finally be as invisible as she felt. She presses the heels of her hands against swollen eyes, wills back what they threaten to spill. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s not your fault,” Lu Ten says quickly.

It sure _feels_ like her fault. Her fault for being dead in the first place, not to mention being so useless at it that the Spirit World had to drag Gyatso and Lu Ten from their resting places just to give her a chance. Her fault for blundering around aimlessly, for being so sure fear couldn’t touch her if she didn’t stop long enough to let it catch up. Her fault for putting them in danger, for getting them hurt, and they are hurt—she can tell, can hear it in the scratch of their voices and tense breaths when they move. She was right. They are getting weaker.

Like the longer she keeps them here, the more they all suffer.

“You’re right,” she croaks. “We should keep moving.”

 

* * *

 

It’s a little like a perverse form of self-punishment.

As they walk, Toph adamantly ignores the fire under her skin and the cold sweat atop it, the coughs that wrack her chest and the way her balance dips and rotates as though on an axis untethered to her own body. Nausea rolls in waves behind her ribs, but there’s nothing there to swallow down but her own roiling guilt.

They move slow, unsteady. Crest the top of the hill and sit to catch their breath, then begin the careful trek along the other side. Toph puts her head down and plants her steps firm, but focus is fleeting. Her thoughts slip and careen away, jumbled and staticky beneath a white noise, like the roar of water, and it takes her nearly twice as long as it should to realize—it _is_ water. A river. And close, by the sounds of it.

“Guys, wait,” she huffs, and pulls off towards the sound. There’s a steady pressure building behind her eyes, growing ever louder as the water does, but it draws her in, stumbling closer, and closer, until her toes hit the sand at the edge of the bank.

“Oh,” says a woman, soft with surprise and words twinkling like glass. “Are you alright, dear?”

 

* * *

 

Things get a little strange after that.

Toph is vaguely aware of a cool hand against her forehead, of her body lowering to the ground, of the approaching crescendo of Lu Ten and Gyatso’s worried voices and the woman’s stern response, debate and reprimanding over Toph’s current state.

Gyatso’s voice, soft in relief and wonder. “You’re like us, then.”

“I think so,” the woman says, voice firm with resolve and a quiet sort of understanding. “My name is Kya. What can I do to help?”

Toph isn’t aware of anything for a while after that.

 

* * *

 

The trickle of water, muted where her ears are submerged beneath it. She’s floating, body both cool and blessedly warm. A gentle breeze sways overhead, curling through the hiss of rising steam, and Toph drifts, not quite asleep, not quite awake. She feels tears slip through closed lashes and sink, indistinguishable, into the water around her. Fingers card through her hair, combing out the curls and letting them rise around her.

She breathes deep, feels her chest expand painlessly, body lifting and cresting the water’s surface. Her ears breach the water and the night’s sounds hit, but distant, safe. The hoot of an owlbear, stalks of grass bowing in the wind, and Kya’s voice is a gentle hum, familiar and yet distinct. “Feeling better?”

“Mm,” Toph manages.

Kya cups a handful of water, smooths it over Toph’s forehead and lets it run into her hair. Toph reaches out and feels a wall, the natural curve of stone, soaked with warmth from the water and humming with the pull of something ancient. She’s in some sort of pool, she realizes, Kya seated at the edge and leaning over her.

“Healing springs,” Kya explains. “They work wonders on ailments of the mind and body.” She pauses, hand stilling in Toph’s hair. “That was a nasty toxin you ran into. You’re lucky you had your friends with you.”

She is lucky, she thinks foggily. For her friends, her family.

She misses them so much.

“Mm,” she says again, thickly. “I don’t think the Spirit World likes me very much.”

Kya breathes a laugh. “I don’t think the Spirit World is meant for little girls.”

“It’s meant for spirits. Which is why it should let me go.” The words come tight, brittle. Whiny, pathetic, but she doesn’t care anymore.

Kya seems to chose her words with care. “The longer you stay here, the harder it’s going to be for you. The world will not embrace you until you learn to accept your fate. That's how the cycle works here. How it always has.”

Well. At least someone’s finally being straightforward with her. “What about you?” Toph asks. “You and Gyatso and Lu Ten? You’re spiritwalkers, but they got hurt today too.” A breath trembles her chest. “Will the world turn against you too, the longer I make you stay here?”

Kya reaches back into the water, but this time takes Toph’s hand, firm and gentle, pulling her close. The touch bleeds through her skin, to the roots of her, a trail of heat and regret that sets tremors to her bones. “I’m not sure. But I sincerely doubt either one of them will leave you until you’re ready. Please, don’t worry about us. We’re here to help you.”

“To help me die.”

“Oh, Toph,” she says, and the words are so soft, so pained, something in Toph’s chest breaks wide open. “I know this is hard, my dear.”

“I don’t wanna die,” she says.

“I know.”

“I wanna go home.”

And like that, cradled in the healing waters of the arms of a stranger, she finally lets herself cry.


	5. Chapter 5

In the not-quite morning of the Spirit World, Toph lies awake and drowns in the gentle quiet. Last night was—rough. She cried. Like. A lot. She’s pretty sure Gyatso and Lu Ten could hear it even from all the way back where they’d made camp, because when she and Kya returned, dripping wet from the hot springs and wrung dry of tears, neither so much as spoke a word, lest they’d seemed to think they’d shatter her fragile mind.

The thought might have made her angry, but honestly, she feels just as fragile today. 

There’s a rustle from somewhere nearby, shifting of fabric and a slight hitch of a breath. Gyatso. When they first met, he’d drifted like air, soundless and utterly poised, and the fresh reminder of his deteriorating state stings. She thinks of Kya’s words last night, her warning of the Spirit World turning against them.

She wonders if they’re in pain because of her, and feels the low ache of regret. Then Gyatso coughs, and the ache turns to a stab.

Lu Ten has a fire going a few feet away, smoke warm, rich with cherry and oak. This, too, triggers a memory—much older, muted and softened with age. The gardens behind the manor, the gentle trickle of the fountain, the cherry blossoms that drifted down its stream and perfumed the air. Her home, her prison, for so long the furthest edges of her world. And for the first time since leaving, she almost misses it. 

“You’re awake,” says Lu Ten.

"Mmhmm."

He shifts closer, crouches by her side. "How do you feel?"

She rolls to face him, like she could pin him with her sightless stare. "How do  _ you _ feel?"

"I'm okay."

Lie, she thinks, and digs her nails into the earth. Lie lie lie.

"Why didn’t you tell me the Spirit World was turning against you too?”

There’s a sharp breath. Behind him, the others stiffen. 

"We... didn't want you to feel pressured,” Lu Ten says slowly.

"I deserved to know,” she says. “If it's my fault, I deserved to know."

"It's not your fault, Toph," comes Kya's voice.

She sits up with a jolt. If they’re going to gang up on her, she’ll at least go down swinging. "It is! It is my fault. You're here because of me." She turns her gaze, lands it somewhere in the silence behind which Gyatso hides. “And you! I wouldn't have asked you to come with me in the first place if I'd known."

"The Spirit World put us here to help you," says Lu Ten.

The smoke feels darker, now. Heavier. The sweetness turns cloying, suffocating, and it’s a different time, a different place, but a voice she’s heard a thousand times before. "I don't  _ want  _ your help." 

“Toph—” That soothing, motherly voice again, and it’s too much, too familiar, and Gyatso  _ still  _ won’t say  _ anything. _

She starts to her feet before the tears of frustration can escape. There’s a flurry of movement as they others start after her, but she’s already spun around, arms flung out to feel her way. She will  _ not  _ cry in front of them. She will not  _ prove them right.  _

The brush thickens, bends and snaps under the stomp of her feet as a hand clasps around her arm. “Toph,” Kya soothes. “Please—”

"I just—" she hiccups. "I just need a second, okay?”

"You shouldn't go alone."  _ Spirits,  _ she sounds just like Katara, and the very thought has a new pang of longing shot through her like an arrow.

She wrenches away, and before Kya can touch her again—gods is she sick of being touched—screams, "I don't need your help!"

Kya’s breath catches and Toph’s away again, feet numb as they trip and stumble over roots and uneven earth, knuckles scraping along the bramble and bark that guide her, until at last they feel far enough away that she can breathe again. She doesn't  _ care _ if it's dangerous. She doesn't care if a komodo rhino comes charging out of the bushes this very second to trample her where she stands. As long as it’s  _ her  _ and not them. 

She scrubs at her eyes, kicks at the dirt with her  _ useless  _ feet, and stares at nothing, stomach churning with something between fury and grief. 

She should go on without them.

Really, what has she got to lose? It’s not like she can die any more than she already has. What’s the worst that could happen? Maybe she’ll be better on her own. Maybe they're the  _ reason  _ she hasn't been able to leave yet.

Maybe, with her gone, the others can—go back. Rest. Be safe.

She’s off before the idea is even fully settled, steps quick and hard with blind conviction, further and further, into the sloping jungle. The leaves almost seem to bow around her, pulling her deeper, and she doesn’t know how long she walks for, but distantly, she registers the shifting underbrush, the cries of the cricketflies, hooting birds and croaking lizardtoads, the jungle alive once more, as though a sudden dusk has fallen to awaken all that slept in the day. High above, a breeze rustles the canopy, the sound of fluttering leaves like rain, before the wind pools down, cold and calm, drawing her forward. 

Her toes hit water. 

Toph comes back to herself with a start. She’s on the bank of a river, waves lapping over smooth rock, warped and slick from what must be centuries of persistent erosion. A wave washes over her feet, then drifts lazily back, beckoning. Her stomach lurches as the wind at her back picks up, but she plants herself in a low crouch, heart thunderous as she clings to the earth, pulling herself back up the slope inch by treacherous inch. 

Somehow, she's not surprised when Gyatso speaks.

"This river will take you onward. Forward. Into the next stage of existence."

Toph freezes. Below, churning waters. Above, a yawning breeze. "I said I wanted to be alone."

"Ignoring us will not put us to rest, Toph,” he says. “Only this can.”

She closes her eyes. Breathes hard through her teeth. Clenches aching fingers around moss and rock. A hand closes around her shoulder and she jerks back, throat right and spiked with panic that he’ll try to throw her into the water.

He pulls away, breath sharp and surprisingly pained. "I cannot do this for you. It must be your choice."

Right. Like she’s ever been given a  _ choice  _ here. "My friends still need me.”

"You have fought very bravely. But you cannot fight your way out of this one."

That flare of anger again, low and ember-hot. " _ Stop _ telling me what I can't do. I ended a war. I saved millions of lives. I took lives too. And one day, I'll pay for that. But right now, my friends still need me." She stands, plants a foot and climbs one slippery step up from the bank, then the next, and the next, until she’s right in his face, until he is  _ forced  _ to  _ see her.  _ "And I will not abandon them."

The declaration is met with silence. For a long moment, he doesn’t even seem to breathe. Then, quietly, "The war is over?"

"Aang's still fighting,” she says. “We all are. Every day, there's another fire to put out. Another dispute to settle. There’s a hundred years of wrongs to put right, and I'm not leaving them to do that alone."

And that’s the truth of it, plain and simple, stubborn and  _ right.  _ They can keep her here for as long as they want, but that conviction will never erode. 

This time, no one tries to stop her when she leaves. She walks against the wind, against the stream, against the world, leaving Gyatso behind. She couldn't look back if she wanted to.

 

* * *

 

She walks upstream for what feels like hours. Her legs burn from exertion, breath coming in ragged pants.

Eventually, the trickle turns to a rush, white water cresting the bank and spilling over, slicking the rocks beneath her feet, but she isn’t afraid of falling in. She feels utterly calm, filled with a glacial rage, hard certainty that she will not trip, will not break, will not give in. If this is her choice to make, then she’s made it. And the Spirit World can throw whatever it wants at her, no pain or fear or  _ guilt _ will change her mind.

And it’s this certainty she holds on to, desperately, furiously, as stubborn as the iron in her bones. It’s this she holds on to, as the forest thins out, as the river turns sharp and empties across a wide plain, as the air turns gritty with dust and salt, wind howling over jagged earth. Far below, waves crash against a cliff.

It’s this she holds on to, as a voice cuts through that wind, low and sharp, ancient and yet deeply familiar. 

“Toph Beifong,” says Avatar Kyoshi. “I hear you’ve been giving our Spirit World some trouble.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeesh. Apologies for the wait and for the shortness of this chapter. We're almost there, folks!


End file.
